


Burnt-Out Hearts

by redpantsandjam (fullonzombae)



Series: The Price of a Heart [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Grief/Mourning, Grieving Greg, Grieving John, M/M, Post-Season/Series 02, Pre-Season/Series 03, grieving Mycroft, grieving victor, non-canon compliant, possible triggers for eating disorders and alcohol abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-12
Updated: 2016-07-12
Packaged: 2018-07-23 14:07:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7466277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fullonzombae/pseuds/redpantsandjam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the months that follow Sherlock's 'death', the people who surrounded him in life come together in ways that no-one would have expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burnt-Out Hearts

The first time John saw the tulip upon Sherlock's grave, he thought nothing of it. It was, after all, the norm. Flowers flanked the headstone, cards of sympathy from people John remembered, people John had never met. This tulip was just another flower – plain and simply a commemoration from a fellow mourner.

The second time John saw the tulip, it lay upon fresh snow, footprints leading both up to and away from the grave. A small card lay attached to the flower, and John bent down, wondering if there were social codes about reading the cards other people left at graves. There was an air of hesitance as he picked up the flower, carefully examining the colour – hues of reds, yellows and oranges that Sherlock, no doubt, would have appreciated.

It was a fact that had never made it onto John's blog that, in the shelves of 221b, there was a book, filled with pressings of flowers. Petals. Leaves. A collection that Sherlock treasured almost as much as the dog hairs which – for whichever reason – were collated lovingly in the bathroom. It was this side of Sherlock that John had wanted to preserve. This man, so removed from the cold and calculating sleuth that the world so often saw, instead immersed in the beauty of nature as if it was another mystery for him to solve.

The tulip, had Sherlock seen it, would have most likely found its way into those pages, freeze dried and honoured, out of sight until a moment of calm descended over the flat and Sherlock found himself absorbing the atmosphere of a quiet 221b. John had often returned to find Sherlock pouring over the pages of his flower collection – often as the rain hammered on the windows late at night, and several pints of beer fuelled each of John's movements. It was a moment of beauty, a calm amongst the usual hurricane that was his flatmate. It was, the first time John witnessed it, the realisation that Sherlock was more than chaos and crimes, more than the mould spore samples that lined the bathroom that morning, or the way he forced a meltdown back after his sock index had been interfered with.

The tulips came regularly, left weekly, yet the person – male, if the footprints leading up to the grave had been any indication – managed to evade John at every turn. It was a person who wanted to keep his solitude in mourning, but John found himself replaying a thousand questions in his mind. Why tulips? Was he deliberately hinting at any form of romantic interest between himself and the late detective? If so, why had Sherlock never mentioned a partner? It became a regular internal dialogue that plagued John as he created the sender in his mind. It became a way for him to feel less alone as he graced Sherlock's graveside, imagining this conversation over and over again. Sometimes, he'd imagine conversation veering towards more general topics – The trial of David Norris and Gary Dobson, the Queen's diamond jubilee – even the heavy snow that was plaguing the country throughout February. Companionship, it seemed, was what he missed – having his friend there to talk to. But uttering Sherlock's name still felt painful, like a reminder of how he'd missed all the signs. But having someone who, apparently, cared for Sherlock to talk to, even if only in his imagination, provided John with some solace and made the transition from winter to spring a little easier to bear.

It was summer when John felt his heart stop. By the grave stood a man, not much taller than himself, his black hair cropped short against his skin. As he stood less than twenty metres away, he watched as the man stopped to lay a flower on Sherlock's grave and then stood straight, paying a silent vigil. It was the most private of moments, and one that John felt it would be improper on which to intrude. Instead, he waited until the man turned to leave the headstone, his hands thrust into the pockets of a hooded jumper. Taking strides towards him, John felt a surge of relief as the stranger stopped in his tracks, turning to face him.

He had seen the stranger once before. In the months before, at Sherlock's funeral, many faces had come and passed, many offering John their condolences. Many stopping to talk to Mycroft. The man who stood in front of him now had remained somewhat close to Mycroft throughout the funeral, dark circles under his eyes, his face freshly shaven, yet covered with small nicks from a lack of care with a razor. A lack of care, John could empathise with. Yet as he had approached Mycroft, the man had moved away, pulling a packet of cigarettes from his pocket, refusing to meet eye contact with John.

Today, however, was different. The smart suit from the funeral had been replaced by a hoodie emblazoned with three letters – UEA – and the shaving had been completed with more care, more attention. The dark circles under his eyes were still present, but softer, and the man's lack of eye contact was replaced with a steely gaze, filled with an underlying anger. It was enough to make John wonder if approaching the stranger was, really, in his best interests.

"John. John Watson," he started, extending his hand in an attempt at a handshake, hoping that a friendly demeanour might weaken the man's defences. After all, how many times had he seen the prickliness fade from Sherlock once he realised someone could be an ally, not a threat? But the stranger remained unfazed, unblinking and unwelcoming, glaring down at John's hand as if John had just offered him something unsavoury.

"Yeah. I know." There was a lilt to his voice, an almost sing-song accent. Something most definitely not from London. As he looked back up at John, his mouth pulled into a tight line, one that displayed his disgust at the introduction. "Well?"

He offered no name, no salutation, and John dropped his hand as if he'd been taken aback by the prickliness of the man's exterior. "Sorry. It's just... I'm guessing you were a friend of Sherlock's." He nodded back towards the grave, noticing how the man remained stoic, unwilling to even look in the opposite direction. Instead, the strangers lips parted in what appeared to be an exasperated sigh.

"He never said you were observant." The last word was spat out, his sarcasm clear for John to hear, and John watched as the man turned to leave, wondering just what he had done to offend this man that he was yet to know.

* * *

 

It wasn't that Victor had cause to hate John, despite how he had felt the first time he'd encountered Sherlock's flatmate. Ex-flatmate. As Greg had laid sprawled out on his sofa, the contents of what seemed to be an entire bottle of whiskey rendering him unconscious, Victor envied his cousin's ability to get lost in a crutch, however addictive - however dangerous that may sound. Picking the glass from the table, he swilled the watered down dregs, walking through to the kitchen as he wondered just when you stopped talking about your deceased fiance as the man you intended to marry. If there was a timeline, Victor could only guarantee that the first time he described Sherlock as anything other than a current, living being, it would burn the back of his throat the way that a cheap bottle of vodka does when you find yourself on the swings of the local park, aged thirteen, trying to act up to the bravado of your friends who surround you. It was all for appearances.

The first time he'd come face to face with John, Victor had fought back the urge to swing for the man who had talked of Sherlock's death as if he was the one who had the most right to grieve. The one who had written of Sherlock's death whilst Mycroft had stood in the hallway of Victor's house, stuttering out an attempt at an apology for what had occurred. For Victor, there wasn't a reprise, there wasn't an outpouring of solidarity, and as he went forgotten by the outside world, watching how they rallied around John, he felt nothing but betrayal. Nothing but anger. He had, after all, seen how John had so frequently laid insults at Sherlock's feet by the way of blog posts that refused to see Sherlock as more than a heartless machine.

Each time John had spoken words that had seared Sherlock, more than he had cared to admit, Victor had found a message from the detective, cursing something vague and trivial. It was rare that Victor could coax the true source of Sherlock's foul moods from him, but the rare times that he could tally Sherlock's moods with John's blog, or the times he'd return from work to find the detective sat on the steps of his father's manor, a cigarette between his lips, he'd find that correlation so clear that he didn't need his boyfriend's analytical mind to see what was truly going on.

John had laid the blame at the feet of people who surrounded Victor. He could see how Mycroft looked more tired the days following Sherlock's death, his grief heightened by the tirades that had left John's lips. He could, in many ways, understand how John felt Mycroft was to blame for selling all of Sherlock's secrets out to Moriarty. There had, after all, been an initial outburst of anger from Victor as Mycroft relayed the entire story that had led Sherlock to the roof. He could understand the anger that Greg hadn't been able to protect Sherlock, but then he saw the pitiful sight that had turned up on his doorstep, talking about how he'd lost everything.

It became a ritual. Once a week, he'd make the journey from Norwich to London, a single tulip from his estate to lay at Sherlock's grave. Each one was trimmed and laid in the same position, each one the closest Sherlock would get to smelling the flowers at the Trevor estate once more. He cast his mind back, each time, to the times Sherlock had joined him there - how he'd managed to unravel a lifelong family secret, mistaking it for common knowledge. How he'd encountered the wrong side of Billy, the family's bull-mastiff. How the first few times Sherlock had visited, he'd stuck out like a sore thumb, unable to keep his opinions to himself as one expected in the quieter outskirts of the county, but how - as time went on - Victor would have people ask if he'd be joined by Sherlock this summer.  
  
That weekend, however, he had seen John watching him. He had seen the way the man Sherlock had come to call his friend approached him, and he felt a rage boiling inside him. There was an arrogance about John, something the doctor suppressed so easily, but it shone through in those words - in 'assuming' Victor was a friend of Sherlock's, as if it came as a shock that there were people in Sherlock's life that he was yet to meet. It was enough to make Victor want to reel off the names John wouldn't have heard throughout his life, just to spite the man, but his residual anger was enough to draw him away.  
  
A knock at Victor's hotel room door was enough to disturb that first sip of his morning coffee. He had once chastised Sherlock for the fact he never ate in the morning; now, it was a habit Victor had adopted, prefering the pang of hunger to the other pains that accompanied grief. He cursed silently, the knock enough to jilt him and send a trail of coffee down an otherwise pristine shirt. Dabbing at himself with a napkin, he opened the door, his eyes setting on the familiar face of Mycroft Holmes.

* * *

  
Sorting out the messes that his brother had left behind had become routine. John, in many ways, had been easier. Blocking credit cards and debit cards stopped the spiral into that old Watson trap of burying your problems at the bottom of a bottle. When you have eyes and ears in the right place, you can stop those purchases that slowly tear one's life apart. It wasn't interference, he'd argue. It was protection.  
  
Greg, however, was a work in progress. He'd see to it that the Detective Inspector was cleared of any wrong-doing. After all, Greg's intentions had always been in the right place and that, these days, was a rare occurence in the world that Mycroft found himself dealing with. After all, when one spends day after day dealing with the Farages, Camerons and Duncan-Smiths of the world, a Lestrade was something of a treasure. A man who understood that, behind the troubled young man who had sat in his office on morning seven years ago, there was a raw talent and a genius that could so easily be dragged into something evil. Lestrade had given Sherlock a purpose and a chance, and for that, Mycroft was grateful.  
  
But Victor? How, Mycroft wondered as he watched the man that answered the door, was he supposed to fix this? There was no manual for how to fix a broken heart, and apparently force-feeding your brother's mourning lover was considered frowned upon in most political and social circles. It was tempting, however, for as slender as Victor had been beforehand, Mycroft could tell he'd lost more weight since the funeral.

"No breakfast?" he commented as he stepped into the hotel room, and Victor moved back over to the desk, picking up his cup of coffee by means of demonstration before taking a sip. If there had ever been a God, Mycroft felt now would have been an appropriate time to ask why he insisted on pairing one impossible Holmes with one impossible Trevor.  
  
"Not hungry," Victor replied as he replaced his cup and headed to the wardrobe, pulling out another shirt. There was a huff of irritation from Mycroft, and he contemplated reminding Victor of the countless lectures he'd given Sherlock about how one could not consider eating thrice a week to be healthy. The moment that Mummy had decided Victor could come back to dinner again was after Victor not only insisted Sherlock was going to join them for dinner but then ensured that Sherlock ate every morsel on his plate. "I'll get something at lunch time."  
  
"At least you're shaving of your own accord. I suppose it's a step in the right direction." It was enough to invoke a look of irritation from Victor as he fastened the buttons on his shirt and reached for his tie. "I hear you've had the pleasure of meeting John, at long last." Another angry glare, but Mycroft stepped closer, finding himself growing increasingly frustrated at the fact that, at 32 years old, Victor still couldn't tie a bloody tie. Finally happy with his work, he stepped back, pretending not to notice how Victor loosened it slightly.

"I'd hardly call it a pleasure."

"Despite what you think of the man, Sherlock did care deeply for him."  
  
"Didn't stop all those insults, though, did it? Didn't make him notice that Sherlock was on... If they were that close, he should have seen something was..." Victor trailed off, and Mycroft pitied the way he still couldn't bring himself to talk of what happened to Sherlock. "Perhaps if he'd been a better friend to him, Sherlock would still be here."  
  
The words hit like a sledgehammer, and Mycroft's lips pursed deep in thought. He took a sharp intake of air, turning back to head towards the door. "Perhaps you're right. But there's a chance you're wrong, and right now, I think no-one benefits from all this anger. John is as alone as you are, right now, and I truly think that you could both benefit from trying to find some common ground." He turned back towards Victor, firing him a quick smile. "Now. Don't spill coffee down that one." 

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this fic comes from a poem by A.E. Stalling, called Tulips which, when reading the poem, felt very fitting to the first chapter, in particular.


End file.
